Last week the Liaoning completed its first onboard officers training and certification program and a group

of five pilots entered the history books by becoming the PLANs first batch of fliers to be fully qualified as naval aviators. Landings and take-offs from a small carrier like the Liaoning require great skills, supreme eye-brain coordination and a brave spirit. The five pilots trained on the Liaoning carrier using the naval J-15 aircraft doing numerous landings and take-off exercises but the Liaoning is a bit too small for the J-15. Training should be done on deck simulators built on land the so-called carrier-in-the-cornfield. This is because a tiny mistake by a novice pilot training on a small carrier sailing at sea could result in his plane hitting the vessel and starting a fire on the ship. The Liaoning is a ship strictly for veteran pilots or very experienced aviators. The Liaoning should be assigned as a drone carrier or a carrier for training drone operators and testing / operating advanced combat drones. A bigger carrier must be built for use as a genuine aircraft carrier. Its flight deck must be much longer than the short 300-metre deck of the Liaoning. This is to enable large attack fighters like the JH-7 to make use of the ship during times of crises or during military confrontations. Pilots who are able to fly such a large fighter off a carrier as well as land on it make very good candidates for employment as airline pilots when they leave military service. Thus bigger carriers are absolutely necessary for nations with huge defence requirements and huge aviation industries.